Samuel Howard

Name: Samuel Xavier Howard

Gender: Male

Age: 17

Grade: 12th

School: Cochise High School

Hobbies and Interests: Cooking and baking, debate, true crime shows, horror, writing and worldbuilding

Appearance: Samuel is very large and imposing, standing at a height of 6’0”. He is broad-shouldered and heavyset at 200 lbs., most of it fat around his belly, arms and thighs. Samuel is of African-American descent, which shows in his dark skin. He is square-jawed and has thick lips, with a hawkish nose below pale green eyes. His hair is put up in dreadlocks and is kept tied back most of the time. While normally clean shaven, he has a good amount of stubble in an attempt to grow a beard.

Samuel’s wardrobe is very casual and minimal: he mostly wears t-shirts, though he’ll put on a sweatshirt in cooler weather and is fond of wearing sweaters in the winter. In the summer he’ll wear basketball shorts and in the winter will alternate between sweatpants and jeans. On the day of the trip Samuel was wearing a navy blue sweatshirt over a purple t-shirt, paired with grey sweatpants and plain red and black sneakers.

Biography: Samuel Xavier Howard was born on May 8th, 1997, to George Howard and Jocelyn Ramsay. George and Jocelyn were a young couple, and at first their relationship was a fun, non-committal one. When they found out Jocelyn was pregnant, they talked it through with each other and decided to make the best of their situation. They got married and settled down in Kingman, where Samuel was born. His infancy was turbulent: the couple soon discovered that neither was well-equipped to raise a child, and the two often bickered over trivial matters out of stress. A few months shy of Samuel’s birthday, the two decided to break it off in a quiet divorce: Samuel was to live with George, who moved in with his mother due to financial instability.

Samuel was raised by his father and grandmother, Violet Howard. Violet was a widow, her husband, Ernest, having died a couple years before Samuel’s birth. As such she was happy to have her only child back in the house, along with a new grandson. She took care of Samuel during the day while George was off at work, and George made sure to spend time with him in the evenings. Samuel was doted on in his childhood, having the attention of either his father or grandmother for most of his early life. He liked both equally growing up, though he spent more of his time with his grandmother.

Violet ended up passing down a love of baking to Samuel: she often passed the time baking or cooking, and out of boredom Samuel was often by her side during these times. Violet would often have him help due to her age, and Samuel would fetch ingredients or help out with minor steps in the recipes. While Samuel was initially indifferent and saw it as a chore, he began to appreciate his work and find it fun. It felt satisfying to contribute to the process, and he loved the baked goods he got out of it. At age six he decided that he wanted to try and make them on his own. Violet was very supportive, and decided to take it slow, letting him complete more of the process over time. It took a while, but Samuel managed to bake a batch of cookies by himself by age ten (under his grandmother’s supervision). He was ecstatic, and began to bake frequently as he grew up.

Samuel wasn’t a very active child, preferring to keep his nose in a book during recess. He loved reading, enjoying the stories as an escape from his mundane life. Samuel found himself drawn to longer series as he grew attached to the characters and enjoyed reading multiple books detailing their adventures. His tastes varied wildly, and he read every book he could get his hands on. In his free time he spent his time daydreaming, thinking of how the stories he read could’ve gone and making up some of his own.

Grades-wise, he was unspectacular: he kept them up at a respectable level, though he tended to rush through his work and never put much effort into his schoolwork. Part of him also didn't seem to care: he was unperturbed by school deadlines, and never made a huge fuss about them. He was, in short, very CALM about it. He made an effort to keep his grades acceptable, but he didn't have the drive or motivation to achieve anything higher. His family was lax when it came to grades, so Samuel saw no need to fuss over it.

Samuel was always aware of his attraction to both boys and girls, though he never thought much of it until seventh grade. During this time Samuel learned more in-depth about the concept of sexual orientation, and he made the connection between his feelings and came to the conclusion that he was bisexual. While he didn’t dispute or deny it, he was worried about the repercussions - Kingman was a fairly conservative area, and though his family was secular and didn’t bring up the topic he was skeptical of their views. He chose to reveal it to them slowly, bringing up LGBT-related issues and seeing their reactions. Both his father and grandmother had lukewarm responses, but they weren’t hostile enough to deter him.

He came out to them a few days shy of his fourteenth birthday, to a relatively positive reaction. Both of them were shocked at first, though George was quick to accept and support his son’s sexuality. Violet took longer to come around to the concept, but decided that it was best for Samuel to receive support and to love him no matter what. With a supportive family, Samuel gradually came out to his peers, telling his close friends and letting it spread from there. He lost a few friends as a result, though he figured that it was for the best. While he wasn’t well-known to his classmates enough for it to have a serious effect on his social life otherwise, it did draw some ire from his more closed-minded classmates. Samuel was heartbroken, but with his family’s encouragement he took it in stride until the bullying died out some time after they entered high school. He surrounded himself with a more supportive friend group, and over time became confident in his sexuality.

When he wasn’t reading, Samuel was often sat in front of the TV. He enjoyed watching cartoons as much as every other kid, but one day he happened to stumble upon the channel Investigation Discovery, and his morbid curiosity drew him in. He liked the thrilling and suspenseful parts of programs such as Dateline or Homicide Hunter, and fell in love with the true crime genre. This branched out into an overall appreciation of horror, liking it for the same reasons as he liked true crime shows. Several favorites include the Halloween series, the Blair Witch Project and Sinister. His father and grandmother thought he was too young to be watching these sorts of things and forbade him from watching them. A rebellious Samuel then turned to the internet to indulge his hobbies, despite getting caught multiple times. However, he got fairly good at keeping his activities a secret.

His time on the internet exposed him to a number of thing the most prominent of which was online roleplaying. He was already prone to daydreaming about stories and the concept of writing was appealing to him. Samuel quickly wrapped himself up on roleplaying on forums, creating characters and interacting with others. At first he wrote self-inserts in fan-derivative forums, but as he spent more time writing he diversified his subject matter, branching out into original and unique settings and exploring different character archetypes. There was a noticeable jump in the quality of writing as time went on, and he considered himself to be a decent writer. He began to post non-roleplay related writings on Tumblr, a site he has a presence on since being drawn in by fandom blogging.

As Samuel grew older, he began to spend more time fleshing out the world his stories took place in. It started with him building off of other story settings like Harry Potter, thinking up headcanons and minor world details to make the world more fleshed out and detailed. It felt more realistic to him to figure out how these fictional worlds worked, and what it was like beyond the story's cast and events. As he grew to love expanding on fictionalized worlds, he started to think up original ones. In middle school he decided to start up a fantasy story project, which became a hodgepodge of story elements bouncing around his head that Samuel found appealing. It didn’t take him long to stumble upon the concept of worldbuilding and found it enjoyable. He thought it was neat to have a whole, fleshed-out universe of your own to play around with, and looked up to authors like J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis who pulled it off well. He is continuously working on the project, and often posts about it on a Tumblr sideblog.

While Samuel had no leanings on optimism or pessimism in his younger years, he began to lean towards pessimism as a teenager. He became involved in social justice on the internet, and became more aware and sensitive to race and LGBT-related issues that seem commonplace in modern society. He also learned more about the civil rights movement and other activist movements through school and his own research. Samuel noticed a pattern of oppression and justice throughout history, and came to the conclusion that equality was a perpetual struggle that wasn’t going to be overcome anytime soon. He became jaded to the questionable morality of American society, and the human race as a whole. Despite this, he holds a hope that true equality will be achieved someday, though he believes that it won't be in his lifetime. However, it didn’t mean that current contributions to the cause aren’t fruitless. He doesn't expresses his views during his day to day life, though he does so through the school's debate team. Despite his strong opinions, he is good at keeping his emotions in check and never gets too worked up while debating. He is also very stubborn and persuasive.

Samuel keeps a relatively low profile in Cochise’s social landscape, interacting little outside of a small circle of friends from the debate team or people who share his liberal views or interest in horror. It takes Samuel a while to warm up to new people, so most of his group is old friends he’s known throughout high school. He retains his calm disposition, and is an easygoing person to hang out with. He is reserved around acquaintances and strangers, though he can maintain causal conversation with almost anyone. He can be fairly inflexible when it comes to making plans, being too lazy to go out and flaking out often if he doesn’t feel like it when the time comes. He is more accessible through texts or online chatting, though he is more punctual with a few people he holds close. One of these people is Penelope Fitzgerald, his girlfriend. Samuel is very warmhearted towards her and fawns over her constantly, routinely giving her baked goods and showering her with affection.

Samuel’s high school performance as of late is characterized by senioritis: while he routinely achieves As in his English classes and cooking electives, he has Bs and Cs in his other classes, mostly out of disinterest and a general lack of motivation. He isn’t sure what to do after high school. Samuel has considered making a career out of writing, and while he is all for it he doesn’t see it as a stable career. He has also thought about working as a chef, though he’s torn between attending culinary school or working right out of high school. The latter seems likely due to insufficient funds and general apathy towards education. Without many other choices, working right out of high school and trying to write on the side is his best option.

Advantages: Samuel is a large and imposing individual, and if he isn’t intimidating from a glance he has a lot of weight to throw around in combat. He is also level-headed and can keep his emotions in check.

Disadvantages: Thanks to Samuel’s lazy nature and regular consumption of baked goods, he is overweight and in poor overall health. He has little faith in the morality of others, so he isn’t likely to trust others completely.

Designated Number: Male student No. 031

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Designated Weapon: Crossbow (20 bolts)

Conclusion: Alright kid that's a nice crossbow you have there, you also have the weight and sad sack social life. Time to become one of those killers from the horror movies you love so much. - Josie Knight

'The above biography is as written by Aloha. No edits or alterations to the author's original work have been made.'

Evaluations
Handled by: Aloha

Kills: None

Killed By: Min-jae Parker

Collected Weapons: Crossbow (20 bolts) (assigned weapon, to Min-jae Parker)

Allies: None

Enemies: Darius Van Dyke, Min-jae Parker

Mid-game Evaluation: Samuel woke in a room of the intensive care wards, yawning and alerting Rene Wolfe and Caleb Diamond to his presence. He tried to slip away but Rene found him accidentally. They were both in turn surprised by the whimsical antics of Caleb in his assigned Nixon mask. The bell tower was rung by Jeremy Frasier and all three heard, but Samuel at least had no intent to follow the sound. Caleb tried to get either to stay, but both Rene and Samuel left shortly thereafter.

Samuel crossed the bridge to the Staff B dorm. He was met by a paranoid Darius Van Dyke, and Samuel quickly got Darius to run off with a few aggressive words. Samuel found another threat, armed, in Kimiko Kao but she stood down peacefully when prompted. Neither of them were able to get much out of the other, and Kimiko fled. This left Samuel to find himself a bedroom to barricade and rest and eat in. He woke to announcements the next day, surprised to hear confirmation that Kimiko had killed, but he opted to sleep in a few more hours before relocating, intent on finding his girlfriend Penelope Fitzgerald.

This led him to the asylum library, where he passed more idle time reading, as he still hadn't found anything in particular. He overheard Min-jae Parker, who had entered the library, and went to investigate. Jae revealed he had a weapon, leading to Samuel panicking and taking the first shot, which missed. Jae retaliated by throwing a book at him and attacking, and Samuel tried to defend himself by hitting him in the face with the crossbow. This drove Min-jae into a rage and he ended up beating Samuel to death.

Post-Game Evaluation: Guess you're more the black guy who dies first than the one in the hockey mask, B031. At least that crossbow went to somebody with some actual killer instinct. - Josie Knight

Memorable Quotes: "Shut uuuup. I don't wanna start shit... Unless of course you want to..." - to Darius Van Dyke when he accused Samuel of threatening him.

Threads
Below is a list of threads that contain Samuel, in chronological order.

V6 Pregame:
 * Cruising and Perusing
 * TROUBLE

Sadie Hawkins Dance:
 * The Sweetest Things

V6:
 * Lone Wolfe
 * Room of Relaxation
 * Into the Veil

Your Thoughts
''Whether you were a fellow handler in SOTF or just an avid reader of the site, we'd like to know what you thought about Samuel Howard. What did you like, or dislike, about the character? Let us know here!''